Stephanie Tyler - Redemption

More than okay, and Bish knew it, only kept probing to see me squirm. Asshole.

“Always said you’d fall for someone in a goddamned split second.”

Shut the fuck up.

Bish smiled and then went serious. “Got your back.”

You never have to say it.

“Sometimes, I want to.”

In your wildest dreams

Jessa

It was a warehouse, with high ceilings and reinforced metal and small windows that were shuttered against the storm. When the music that had been playing came to a stop, I heard hail hit the metal and it sounded like bullets. I cringed the first twenty times or so and then my senses got used to the dull pings.

At some point, Bishop had disappeared, but Mathias was here with me. I can’t say I wasn’t happy about that. I knew there must be some kind of underground bunker, like we’d had in D.C., and the thought of all the people I’d have to meet frightened me. At that point, I was ready to pray that the storm continued indefinitely, if it meant I’d just stay here with Mathias.

I rubbed my bare arms and shivered. The warehouse was heated, but the ceilings were so high, it was hard for it to stay very warm. It didn’t help that my feet were bare.

It didn’t help that I knew Mathias was watching me—watching me in the way a man watches a woman he wants. Finally, I turned toward him.

I was sure he was armed, but in the blur of the fighting, I hadn’t seen him pull a weapon. And he hadn’t pulled one on me after I’d stabbed him. He hadn’t, at any point I’d seen, taken time to dress, or even look at the wound. I couldn’t see anything through the jacket though, and I thought better of reminding him what I’d done.

I looked down just then and realized I was covered in dirt and blood and dust. Self-consciously, I touched my hair, which must’ve been the rat’s nest it felt like. It had been forever since I’d had a proper shower, which is probably why that man had studied me so hard today before agreeing to buy me.

Maybe I should be grateful I looked like hell. That hesitation allowed Mathias and Bishop time to save me.

I stared at my hands, the blood caked under my nails, and then Mathias’s hand was in front of mine. I looked up and he was right there—I hadn’t heard him move or seen him, but he was holding out his hand to take mine.

I stuck my palm against his and he gave no indication of his feelings, instead gave a light tug and I was following him across the large floor, weaving through motorcycles until we got into a large bathroom area. There was an empty four-stall community shower in here.

“Is there water?” I asked, and he turned it on in the closest stall, put my hand under the cold water, pointed to the hot and shook his head. When I told him, “I don’t care,” he turned, grabbed a few towels and placed them on a bench outside the shower. And then he took off his shorts and disappeared...into the next shower.

I didn’t look but I heard the water turn on. There was a five-foot wall between the two, and the showers faced in opposite directions. It took everything I had not to blatantly stare at him, and after the experiences with men I’d had recently, you’d think I’d want nothing to do with any of them. But my body felt differently about Mathias, and the sensation was nerve-racking, to say the least.

“Idiot,” I told myself as I stripped my dirty clothes off and turned the shower on. He hadn’t been kidding about no hot water, and I stood under spray that was so cold it burned and I didn’t care. I rinsed and scrubbed the LoV and Charlie and the entire past weeks off me, rinsed my entire damned life away as fast as I could. I forced myself to rinse the shampoo fully from my hair. My teeth were literally chattering by that point.

I turned the water off. Mathias’s shower was still running. I wrapped a towel around me and dried off my arms and legs, wrapped my hair and rubbed some of the water out of it. And then I finally got the courage to look over at Mathias. There wasn’t a curtain. His back was to me, and he stood with his face under the spray. His shoulders were wide, his back muscled, narrowing to a cut waist—and he was heavily tattooed. The soap ran down the ridges in rivulets, between his ass cheeks, down his muscled thighs and calves.

He wasn’t shivering. I’d stopped too, and now my cheeks were heated. I wasn’t sure if I should be offended or not that he appeared not to have tried to look at me. Which was ridiculous after all I’d been through.

Then again, Charlie and I had barely consummated our marriage.

Mathias was signing something, with his back still to me. Of course, I had no real idea of what he was saying but he obviously knew I was looking and that was the point.

I turned away and noted he’d left me sweatpants and a sweatshirt. I put both on hurriedly, ducking out of his sight when I heard the shower shut off. I was back at the van, sitting inside, my bare feet tucked up under me when he strode out with a towel around his waist, rubbing his hair dry with a second one.

He was completely comfortable with his nudity. I could see why. I wouldn’t have minded if he stayed naked, and my cheeks flushed again for feeling that way.

Where was this coming from? Before today, I might not have fit into my other world, but I’d never have thought that being in this one would make me feel so free. Not after what happened with the Lords of Vengeance. But that, like my time in the bunker, my time with my family and Charlie, seemed like a lifetime ago, and I was ready to live in the here and now, where I was safe.

Besides, Mathias was going to think I was an idiot if I sat here, silently staring at him for much longer.

“I’m sorry.” I pointed to his arm and he shrugged. He’d wrapped a big piece of cloth he’d torn from his T-shirt around it. It was black, so I couldn’t see the blood but I knew I’d hit my mark. I picked up the first-aid kit that had been on the seat next to me. “Will you let me clean it? It’s the least I can do.”

He nodded. But he didn’t move closer to me. He let me move nearer to him and I wondered if they even made gentlemen anymore these days. The world around me had sunk into such a barbaric level that to even see a man who actually still respected women—or did a good job of pretending—was a rare thing.

I pushed my hair behind my ears and dug into the box, grabbing the gauze and peroxide and triple antibiotic cream.

When I looked up at him, he shook his head. “You’re trying to tell me I don’t have to do this.”

He nodded.

“Yes, I do. It’s the least I can do, after you saved me. Twice.”

He pondered that for a second, then typed, And to think , at one point , you hadn’t even known if you’d wanted to live.

As I read, he reached out to brush my scars lightly with his thumbs. He wasn’t ignoring them, choosing instead to acknowledge my pain. Whether or not he understood it didn’t matter. He accepted it as a part of me.

“I don’t...I can’t talk about it. Not yet, okay?” But I wanted to, felt like letting it all spill out.

He didn’t push, simply mouthed, Okay.

“I’ll bet people tell you things all the time—secret things—because they think it’s safe. That you’re safe.”

What do you think?

“That you’re the most dangerous person I’ve ever met. That anyone who thinks you’re safe is stupid.”

You don’t seem to mind.

“I never realized that dangerous might be exactly what I’ve been missing.”

And that scares you , that you might like it.

“Maybe. And maybe there’s such a thing as too much safety.” I paused. “I will tell you why I tried to kill myself.”